Hand printing-wheel



(No Model.) I @Sheets-Sheet 1 M. J'. STARK. Hand Printing Wheel.

No. 232,856.l Patented Oct..5,.1880.

".llllllllllillm I Witnsses (No Model.) 2 Sheets--Sheet 2.

nJfsTAnK. Hand Printing Wheel. N0. 232,856. Patented Oct. 5,1880.

Witnesses: Y Inventor UNITED STATES PATENT OEEicE.

MICHAEL J. STARK, OF BUFFALO, NEW YORK.

HAND PRINTING-WHEEL.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 232,856, dated October5, 1880.

Application filed July 22, 1880.

To all whom it may concern Be it known that I, MICHAEL J. STARK, ofBuffalo, in the county of Erie and State of New York, have inventedcertain new and useful Improvements on Hand PrintingVheels 5 and I dohereby declare that the following description of my said invention,taken in connection with the accompanying sheets of drawings, forms afull, clear, and exact specification, which will enable others skilledin the art to which it appertains to make and use the same.

My present invention has general reference to hand printing-wheels, suchas are used for markingboxes and packages, printing on packing orwrapping paper, paper bags, flour and other barrels, Sac., by means of arubber impression-band secured to the periphery of a cylindrical roller,the impression-band being supplied with the necessary ink byinkingrollers caused to revolve in front of and in contact with theimpression-band.

My invention consists in the peculiar and novel combination of parts anddetails of construction, as hereinafter more fully set forth anddescribed, and pointed out in the claims.

In the drawings already referred to, which serve toillus'trate my saidinvention more fully, Figure lis a side elevation of my improvedprinting-wheels. Fig. 2 is a plan ofthe same. Fig. 3 is a sectionalelevation in line y y of Fig. 2. Fig. 4 is a sectional plan in line :txof Fig. 1.

Like parts are designated by corresponding letters of reference in allthe figures.

Heretofore printingwheels have been made which consisted, essentially,of a U-shaped framehaving in the center of its cross-bar, or that partat right angles to the parallel inembers, a single backward-projectinghandle, by means of which said printing-wheel was operated. Betweenthese parallel members was journaled a cylinder carrying theimpressiondie, and in front of this cylinder were two inking-rollers,one bearin g upon the other, which latter was also caused to bear uponthe impression-die. In some of these wheels the cylinder was returned toits original position by means of aspring as soon as an impression wasmade, and the machine lifted from the surface upon which the printingwas done, while in others the cylinder moved only in one (No model.)

is that, in order to supply all the wants of 6o the public, a largevariety of sizes have to be made and constantly kept on hand. In puttingup these printing-wheels they are required to be made in differentlengths and diameters, and each diameter again with different lengths,so that wheels of, say, sixinches in diameter are required to be madeanywhere from two to twelve inches in length. It will, therefore, beobserved that to meet these requirements alarge number of U-shapedframes of all sizes have to be kept on hand, so as to supply from thisstock any sized printing-machine that may be demanded by the trade.

In order to avoid this necessity of Ykeeping such a large stock on hand,and at the same time to enable me to furnish on short noticeprinting-wheels of a given diameter and any size in length, which is theobject of my present invention, I construct my printing-wheel of a frameconsisting of two separate sides, A A', connected together by means of acrossbar, B. Each of these sides has on its forward end two notches orslots, C, and, centrally, apertures for the passage of a pivoting boltor rod, N. To the upper edge of these sides are cast handles F, runningparallel with said sides, but standing outward, as shown in Fig. 2. Onthe face of the side A there are provided lugs G G, and through thisside and in rear of said lugs there'is a slotted aperture, El.

Between the sides A A is journaled a cylinder, J, having on both endsplates K K', one of which has a slot-hole, j', for the reception of alockingpin, a, on a catch, M, pivoted to the lugs GrV G on the side A bymeans of a pin, g, said locking-pin a being constructed to pass throughthe slot-hole H in said side A into the slot-hole f in said plate K.

On the under side of the catch-piece M is a small projection orrise, andinserted between the finger-piece m of said catch-piece M and the side Ais a spiral spring, O, to keep the IOC catch-piece in a position toautomatically lock the cylinder J as soon as the slot-hole fin the iangeor plate K is in such position as to allow the pin a to enter.

The eylinderJ is journaled between the sides A A' by means of a rod, N,passing through said sides and the plates K K', one of said sides havinga plain aperture for the passage of said rod N, and the other ascrew-threaded aperture for the reception of the threaded portion ofsaid rod N.

The cylinders J, when of small diameter,

are made of solid blocks of wood, a hole being bored centrally throughthem for the passage of the rod N; but when of larger diameter I preferto form them in sections glued together, as shown in Fig. 3. By thisconstruction I produce cylinders that are very light and at the sametime not liable to shrink oval, the same as those made of a solid block.

In wheels having cylinders of considerable length it is diicult toinsert a rod, N, through the entire length, owing to the fact that theaperture in the ilange opposite the side from which the rod is insertedcannot readily be found, so as to pass the said rod through the same. Toavoid this trouble I make, for cylinders longer than six or seveninches, screwthreads in each ange K, and pass short bolts or pivotsthrough the sides into the flanges, taking care to provide one pivotwith a right and the other with a left handed thread and to form thethreads in the plates K correspondingly, so that the pivots cannotunscrew when the machine is being used.

On the sides A A', I provide two hooks, l), to which I attach plates Q,having two apertures, into whichIhang springs S, one of which connectswiththe upper ink-roller P, by means of a plate, B, hung onto the pivotp of said roller, and the other with the lower roller l?,

-themanner of attaching being clearly illustrated in Fig. l. Thesesprings S draw the ink-rollers toward the cylinder J, so as to alwaysrevolve upon and with the impressiondie (not shown) secured to theperiphery of said cylinder, and thereby to supply the same with thenecessary ink.

The ink-rollers P should be covered with some good ink absorbing andretaining materialfelt being preferred-and with a layer of fine linen orcotton, to evenly distribute the ink upon the impression-die.

In the smaller-sized machines I make the screw-spindle N longer thannecessary to pass through both sides A A', so that the projectingportion a serves as a guard for the spiral spring O.

On the connectin grod B, I form angular portions d, Fig. 4, fitting theangular apertures in the sides A A', to retain them in a parallelposition, in conjunction with nuts I, engaging the screw-threadedportions e on said rod B.

It will now be readily observed that in order to supply at short noticeprinting-wheels of any length, I have only to keep on hand theneccessary wood for the cylinders and ink-rollers and castings for thesides A A' and the flanges or plates K K', so that it' I receive ordersfor wheels, say, six inches long or twelve inches long I have vnothingelse to do but to cutthe cylinders and ink-rolls to the desired lengthand make rods B to tit the frames, when my machines are ready to ship,thereby saving me a large amount, which I would otherwise have to investin frames, and considerable time in fitting up.

Owing to the fact that the handles F are formed integral with the sidesA A', which are thereby produced entire in the process of casting, I canproduce wheels of superior quality at a lower figure than thoseheretofore made. rlhese handles are so formed that their rear end is inline with the rear end of the sides A A', so that, assuming the line z zin Fig. 3 to be a base-line whereupon to rest the apparatus, the latterwill stand in a vertical, or nearly vertical, position, whereby theinking-rolls and the impression-cylinder are sustained in the mostadvantageous position to prevent them from soiling surrounding objectswith ink. This construction is quite an essential feature in myprinting-wheels, and has largely contributed toward an extensive sale ofthe machines.

In operation the machine is placed, in the position shown in Fig. 1,upon the article upon whichaprintedimpressionis tobe producedand takenhold of by the two handles F. N 0W the nger-piece m of the catch Misdepressed to withdraw the pin a from the slot-hole f in the flange orplate K of the cylinder J and the machine moved along, which causes theimpression-cylinder to revolve and pass over the surface to be printed.In the meantime the catch-piece lVI is released, so that as soon as thecylinder J has made a complete revolution the pin a will snap back intothe slot-hole f, and thereby arrest further progress of said cylinder,the inking of the impression-die being performed by the ink-rollers Prevolving in contact with said impression-die.

If desired, gages may be placed upon the rod B, to hang downward beyondthe lowest point of the impression-cylinder, to guide the wheel overnarrow boxes, and thereby to properly guide the machine.

Having thus fully described my invention, I claim as new and desire tosecure to me by Letters Patent of the United States- 1. In handprinting-Wheels, substantially as described, sides A A', provided eachwith a handle, F, projectingfrom and above said sides, substantially asdescribed, each of the sides being formed entire in the process oi'casting, as stated.

2. In hand printing-wheels, the combination, with the two sides A A',connected together at their rear ends by a rod, B, of the cylinder J andthe spindle N, passed through said sides and centrally through saidcylinder, said sides having angular apertures at said rear end, and saidrod B having angular sections cl, fitting IOO IIO

said angular apertures in said sides, and nuts I, engaging thescrew-Shanks e, whereby the parallelism of said sides is preserved,substantially in the manner as and for the object stated.

3. In hand printing-Wheels, sides A A', connected together in the rearby a removable cross-bar, B, and centrally by a bolt, N, having itsscrew-threaded end passed through and projecting from one of said sides,in combination with the stop M, having a pin, et, projection b, andspring O, said part of the rod N projecting from said side beingconstructed to serve as a guide for said spring O, as and for thc objectspecified.

4. In hand printing-Wheels, a frame having handles the rear ends ofwhich are in, or nearly in, line with the rear ends ofthe frame, wherebythe machine, when placed in, or nearly in, a vertical position isadapted to rest upon said handles and sides, substantially as described.

5. A hand printing-Wheel in which the sides of the frame are providedeach With a handle projecting sidcwise and upward from said sides, andin which a stop for the cylinder is pivotcd to one of said sides, saidstop having the thumb-piece m near the center of said cylinder, and thepart carrying the pin a in rear of said thumb-piece m, whereby thepressure exerted upon the Wheel through the handles F is caused to actcentrally upon said cylinder, and whereby, furthermore, the stop may bereadily operated by one of the fingers of the hand holding the wheel,substantially as dcscribed.

6. A hand printing-Wheel composed, essentially, of two separate andremovable sides, A A', each having a handle, F, projecting side- Wiseand upward from said sides, a rod, B, connecting the sides at their rearends, a cylinder, J, journaled between said sides upon a rod, N, orequivalent, and ink-rolls P, pivoted in slots in each side, one ot' saidsides having a catch, M, substantially as described,` pivoted to saidside in the manner as and for the object specited.

In testimony that I claim the foregoing as my invention I have heretoset my hand in the presence of two subscribing Witnesses.

MICHAEL J. STARK.V

Attest:

FRANK HIRscH, GEORGE J. STRAUB.

